I’m hoping new neighbor Steve Zahn and co. will be recurring characters, as they will provide numerous awkward moments and disruptions for Phil & Claire’s attempts to maintain a straightlaced reputation.
I’m wondering if the “tension” will lead to accidental experimenting, given that both Phil and Claire have had their freak moments in the past. Plus, Alex could have her chance with a bad boy like the other Dunphy women before her.
I’m sure nothing will go beyond PG-13 territory, but it will be interesting to see how much of the envelope they push.
Frankly I hope they abandon that path. They already have story lines A, B and C, they really don’t need new characters to start a story line D. It somewhat smells like desperation.
On the other hand, it could be that she hasn’t been featured a lot this season precisely because they haven’t had anything interesting for her to do; and so, now, this.
Yeah, that was my concern, too. My wife and i haven’t been very impressed with this season so far, and last week’s episode (Marco Polo) was completely unfunny. I really like Steve Zahn, and i also love Andrea Anders, who plays his wife, and who was fantastic on the very funny (and under-appreciated) Better Off Ted. But this feels like an attempt to save a sinking ship.
Aside from the somewhat stale writing, part of the problem, for me, is the growing up of Manny and Luke. I see Luke as sort of equivalent to Dewey in Malcolm in the Middle; once he loses his young-kid charm, the character isn’t very interesting anymore. And Manny’s precocious personality doesn’t have the same comic appeal now that he’s bigger and his voice had dropped.
I certainly hope it is. Not that the concept isn’t interesting, but this season hasn’t been great, the show may have run it’s course in terms of sophisticated humor, and now we could be in the sitcom soap opera stage where the shows continue storylines but without the quality of humor that brought people to the show to start with.